When Flora Poste (Kate Beckinsale) is orphaned in London circa the 1930s, the independent-minded young woman decides to live off the hospitality of her various relatives, beginning with distant relations in the country... the grim-faced Starkadders of Cold Comfort Farm. Flora's fashionable aunt thinks such an experience sounds appalling, but Flora, who is always ready for an adventure she can write about later, doesn't mind. "Interesting and appalling," she counters brightly.
And indeed, it's both of those things, as Flora predicted. Appalling, extremely interesting--and extremely funny as well. After the setting segues from London to Cold Comfort Farm, the film starts to shift gears into something near high camp.
The residents of Cold Comfort Farm are relentlessly weird, from the humans down to the livestock (one cow is named "Feckless"), and they intone the odd mantras of their regimented existences regularly, as if to hypnotize themselves into believing that they enjoy their lives. Flora views Cold Comfort Farm as a project, an ant farm in need of some humanity, and proceeds to wreak her will with calm efficiency.
Almost everything is played completely straight, which only heightens the humor. Director John Schlesinger was aware, fortunately, that high-key lighting and jokey performances are not always funny. Instead, he has the fine cast play its roles as seriously as if it were high drama, and the production design and cinematography are similarly designed to suit any dramatic production. (One exception occurs toward the end, but by then the lapse in cinematic reality is acceptable and funny in its own right.)
Jerry, Russ, and Sid, three guys living in Jersey City, could be labeled as "petty criminals," but that would be giving them too much credit. As inept at lives of crime as they are at legitimate business ventures and personal relationships, they might be more accurately described as "losers."
But they're fascinating losers, as portrayed in Alan Taylor's Palookaville. William Forsythe stars as Sid, the most stable and the most lonely of the three (he has two dogs for company); Adam Trese as Jerry, who has a wife and small child to worry about; and, in a bravura performance, Vincent Gallo as Russ, a Jerseyite with a Manhattan-sized attitude. Gareth Williams also excels as Ed, a perpetually sullen cop who happens to be Russ's brother-in-law.
What easily could have been made as a heist picture crossed with Dumb and Dumber instead turns out to be a beautifully drawn character piece, sympathetic and very funny, focused on the aspirations and failures of the three wanna-be master criminals. The script takes no wrong turns; performances are right on target; and the technical values, including production design, cinematography, editing, and score, are high. This is a very worthwhile film.
The plot of Twister is the flimsiest possible concoction, the slimmest excuse for an eye-popping melange of special effects: a group of "stormchasers," amateur tornado researchers, drives around Oklahoma putting itself into harm's way as much as possible. Their goal: to go right up to the funnel of a twister and launch "Dorothy," a homemade computerized research system that will make early tornado warnings possible.
Writers Michael Crichton and Anne-Marie Martin do succeed in cooking up an interesting and entertaining batch of stormchasers. Bill (Bill Paxton) has left the stormchasing business, but stumbles back in to help Jo (Helen Hunt), his nearly-ex-wife, in getting Dorothy up in the air. Their gang also includes various young-researcher types, including Dusty, a pothead-type who lives for the thrill of the storms, and various others (including a roadmap navigator played by Alan Ruck, and another teammate played by the fellow perhaps best known as the Aaron Burr historian of the "Got Milk?" commercial).
But the rest of the story is strictly by the numbers. Crichton and Martin provide one of the cinema's clunkiest excuses for exposition in the form of Bill's fiancee (Jami Gertz), a therapist who gets dragged along on the stormchasing runs; naturally she needs everything explained to her. (She also provides "comic relief" by taking cellular phone calls from faraway clients just as the funnels threaten--a running "joke" that wears out its welcome almost before it's arrived. Meanwhile, her propensity for emitting little shrieks of terror after the twisters have wreaked their havoc will make you wish they'd just toss her into the next one and be done with it.)
For extra "drama," Crichton and Martin also add a competing team of stormchasers backed by big corporate dollars and led by Bill's arch-rival Jonas (Cary Elwes). The contrast between the two teams--barely-funded vs. big money, pure science vs. corporate greed, instincts and know-how vs. plagiarism and copycatting--is spelled out so plainly it might as well have been subtitled, but just in case you miss it, the bad guys are subtly outfitted with dark clothes and trucks.
But, of course, the point of Twister is not the story, but rather the stunning computer-generated images it boasts. Director Jan (Speed) De Bont, who conjures danger and excitement much more easily than characterizations and emotion, does an impressive job of making the viewer feel the sensations of being in the center of one nature's most awesome punishments. Human actors are made to share the frame with all sorts of authentic-looking effects--ominous tornado funnels, barns blowing down, and flying debris of all sorts--which the sound design team supplements masterfully.
The story values may be poor, but Twister more or less measures up as far as mindless summer entertainment goes. If you've always wanted to know what it's like to be in a tornado, be sure to see it. Otherwise, hype aside, you won't be missing much.
With all the overhyped, underwritten action pictures that have hit the screen this summer, it was a relief to see John Sayles's Lone Star, which immediately earned itself a place on my personal Best Films of the Year list.
Set in the border region of Rio County, Texas, Lone Star follows Sheriff Sam Deeds (Chris Cooper) after a decades-old skeleton is unearthed in the desert outlying the county seat. Deeds suspects that his late, legendary father Buddy (Matthew McConaughey), who held Sam's office in his day, may have had something to do with the corpse and sets out to learn the truth.
The amazing thing about Sayles is how much substance he can hang from a simple premise. Yes, at heart the film is a basic murder mystery, but its true concern is other issues, such as border politics, race, father-son relationships, and above all, the weight of history--local, national, and personal--and the way events of long ago can still reverberate in the affairs of the living. These issues are explored in a natural and often poignant way--through the story's characters--and without ever making the film feel busy or overloaded.
The entire cast is uniformly superb. Cooper is excellent as the straight-arrow sheriff, and other standouts include Ron Canada as Otis, the "mayor" of the area's black community and owner of a black-patronized bar; Elizabeth Pena as a local schoolteacher; Joe Morton as Colonel Payne, the new commander of nearby Fort McKenzie; Frances McDormand in a brief appearance as Sam's ex-wife; and Kris Kristofferson as Sheriff Charlie Wade, the terror of Rio County before Sam's father got the job.
As we left the theater, my wife wondered at Sayles's incredible ability to depict a local ethos with such assurance. His preceding film, The Secret of Roan Inish, dealt with Irish sea lore so knowingly that one would have thought Sayles was from that region. Similarly, his Passionfish would have convinced one that Sayles hailed from the Louisiana bayous. And here, it seemed impossible to consider that he wasn't intimately acquainted with life in southern Texas.
Clearly Sayles has a marvelous gift for assimilating--whether it's through research or visits, I don't know--the very life of a region and depicting it compellingly on the screen. Combined with his casting, writing, and cinematic storytelling abilities, it all adds up to a filmmaker for whom movie-goers can be profoundly grateful.
The schedule of a working American with a family often seems to demand many more than the 24 hours that come in a day. What if a typical guy, faced with impossible pressures from work and family, were to clone himself, reasoning that two of him could get everything done with time left to spare? Multiplicity, directed by Harold Ramis, carelessly wastes this terrific premise. What could have been a deadly satire of modern life, which values both an exhaustingly hard work ethic and a tireless devotion to family, instead becomes nothing but an excuse for weak slapstick.
Michael Keaton stars as Doug Kinney (doubtless named after Ramis's late National Lampoon colleague Doug Kenney), a put-upon construction chief whose wife Laura (Andie McDowell) takes care of their two young kids. When his boss (Richard Masur) increases Doug's already-hefty job responsibilities just as Laura receives a golden opportunity to return to her real-estate career, Doug foresees his scanty free time dwindling to nothing. An eccentric geneticist hands Doug an irresistible proposition, and before long Doug has a clone living above the garage and going to his job for him. Naturally, it doesn't take long before things go horribly awry.
Both Keaton and the effects wizards do an exceptional job of creating the seamless illusion of multiple Dougs sharing the screen. But they are sabotaged by a weak, sloppy script that has no interest in mining any but the most obvious jokes and situations.
Although any fantasy requires a certain amount of suspension of disbelief, it works best when the non-fantastic elements are made as real and believable as possible. Then the audience doesn't ask questions like: Why does the geneticist decide to clone Doug (not for money, which Doug doesn't have much of, and not for research purposes, since he conducts no study that we see)? Why, if we are told that the memories and personalities of originals and clones are identical at the point of creation, do we see clones display radically different personality traits immediately after being produced? Why don't the clones, who believe themselves to be people as legitimate as Doug himself, protest their second-class treatment by their original? Why doesn't anyone wonder why the lights are always on above the garage? Why doesn't Laura, emotionally battered by the conflicting signals she's receiving from her husband(s), pack up and leave by the middle of the second act?
There are many more such questions, but of course all could have been forgiven if the film had delivered the goods. Instead, the contrived plot offers nothing but the same old routines. The Dougs, caught together at the same restaurant, duck inconveniently under tables and create havoc as the prissy maitre d' and other onlookers look on, gaping open-mouthed and doing nothing. Laura is alternately hostile and seductive as the story seems to warrant, without any regard for actual believable human behavior. And there are lots of loud "bonking" noises as people hit their heads against immovable objects.
There is a certain, finite amount of amusement to be had at such antics, and Keaton does a top-notch job at eliciting it. But there is nothing here to rush out and see. Multiplicity is itself a clone of standard, unremarkable Hollywood comedy, and rest assured that it's not the last.
After twelfth-century French knight Godefroy the Hardy (Jean Reno) accidentally kills the father of his betrothed, he asks an elderly sorcerer to send him back in time so that he can avoid the deed and retain the favor of his fiancee. Instead, the senile wizard sends Godefroy and his servant Jacquasse (Christian Clavier) to present-day France, where they are taken for loonies (or actors) and released into the care of Godefroy's direct descendant, the spitting image of his ex-betrothed, who is married to a dentist and lives in the suburbs.
The film adeptly draws laughs from the anachronistic situation of a genuine knight adrift in modern times--there is great delight in watching Godefroy and Jacquasse slay a taxi, or in hearing them sing a gory war song at their hosts' civilized dinner table. In a slightly more sophisticated turn, the film slyly depicts Godefroy's bewilderment at a politically topsy-turvy France, in which a peasant can own Godefroy's family castle (now a posh hotel) while Godefroy's own aristocratic heirs live like commoners. (When apprised of "recent" French history, Godefroy murmurs, "A great man, this Robespierre.")
The Visitors never quite becomes wildly hilarious, but it is amiable, unpretentious, and funny enough. Reno (better-known here for his roles in The Professional and Mission: Impossible) is marvelous and believable as Godefroy, and Clavier excels in his dual role as Jacquasse, the medieval servant, and Jacquart (Jacquasse's own descendant), the fastidious and detestable hotelier who owns Godefroy's castle.
A Very Brady Sequel is not a movie for everyone; it is a movie for people like me. People who grew up watching a bizarre television family who were out of touch, even at the first airing. People who can recite the plot of any episode within seconds of spotting the opening shot. People who fought with their elementary school friends over who got to play Marcia and who had to be stuck with Jan.
This movie, directed by Alan Ladd Jr., is more enjoyable than its predecessor, The Brady Bunch Movie, mostly because it has a much simpler plot, which revolves around the return of Gary Martin, Mrs. Brady's first husband (whom she had presumed dead). However, this plot is barely noticeable among all the hilarious references to old Brady episodes, some of which appear in an altered context, heightening the humor. In a stroke of genius, the filmmakers have even plausibly included a reference to the highly obscure Brady Bunch Kids animated cartoon.
In addition, this movie is fraught with innuendo and sexual references which contrast humorously with the pure naivete of the original shows. (The viewer gets a clue of what is in store when Mr. Brady comes up with a new way to solve the "who gets the attic room" problem.) The sharp contrast between the Bradys and the rest of 1990s Los Angeles is presented more subtly than in the first movie. In addition, there are highly amusing musical numbers (one of which features Santa Monica's 3rd Street Promenade).
So those of you (and you know who you are) who have even the slightest hint of the "Brady experience" harboring deep within you, do not be ashamed. Go with the right attitude; don't expect more than a well-done spoof, and you will be highly amused.
Director Ed Zwick continues to display his talent for making great-looking, well-crafted, beautifully acted, and engrossing films that nonetheless have very little ambition.
Set a few months after the end of Desert Storm, the story concerns Col. Nat Serling (Denzel Washington), a heroic tank commander in the Gulf War. His Army superior (Michael Moriarty), who has covered up a grave wartime error of Serling's, assigns Serling to investigate the worthiness of killed-in-action Cpt. Karen Walden (Meg Ryan) for a Medal of Honor. In doing so, Serling uncovers a hornets' nest of contradictory stories about the circumstances of Walden's demise (all seen in flashback, Rashomon-style), as he battles guilt over his failure to atone for his own transgression.
The film features impeccable values in all departments. Washington is marvelously convincing as Serling, and the rest of the cast-- which also includes Bronson Pinchot as a zealous White House aide, Lou Diamond Philips as a soldier formerly under Walden's command, and Scott Glenn as a newspaper reporter researching Serling's record--shines as well. Cinematographer Roger Deakins lights the film with striking naturalism, and editor Steve Rosenblum has cut the film thoughtfully and with an eye toward bringing out not only the story's external dramas but the internal ones as well.
The technical values are particularly impressive during Desert Storm battle scenes, which go well beyond the dark, far-away video of the CNN reports to bring the audience right in with the soldiers in tanks, choppers, and on the ground. Seen up close, even in a war where American force so clearly dominated, the combat scenes are stomach-knottingly tense and painful to watch.
Courage Under Fire is an unqualified success in terms of sheer dramatic entertainment value, but I was frustrated by the film's stubborn insistence on touching on all sorts of interesting issues but leaving them thoroughly unexplored.
For instance, the film (clearly not aimed at pacifists) makes no attempt to comment on the actual righteousness of the war--one U.S. soldier's remark about the necessity of defending his country is allowed to pass as the film's only statement on the matter. Any doubts that American security was directly threatened by the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, or musings over what interests were actually served by the Gulf War, are suppressed.
Similarly, while the film spends its time getting up close and personal with Our Sons and Daughters on the American lines, it has no problem with dehumanizing Iraqi soldiers as relentlessly as actual coverage of the war did. Again, a U.S. soldier's words--referring to Iraqi soldiers as "the fuckers"--seem to be the film's only statement on the matter. It may have occurred to the filmmakers that opposing soldiers can be the enemy without necessarily being evil, but if so, they didn't bother to share this feeling with the audience.
I was also bothered by the filmmakers' failure to follow through on one particular facet of their story. Early on, Karen Walden is described to Serling as "butch." I took this as a hint that she would prove to be lesbian, but instead the question is thoroughly skirted throughout the rest of the movie. The story provides Walden with a little daughter, courtesy of a short-lived marriage--which neither confirms nor denies anything about her sexuality. Given the recent hullabaloo over the right of gay and lesbian soldiers to serve in the military, it hardly seems fair for the film to actually raise the issue and then drop it like a hot potato. If the character were intended to be lesbian, why not say so overtly (and face whatever criticism might be elicited from bigoted viewers), and if she wasn't, why suggest it in the first place?
One political issue the film does implicitly recognize, to give credit where credit is due, is the fitness of women for combat and command, by taking for granted that women are members of, and sometimes leaders in, the military. Commendably, the film also avoids the rhetorical pitfall of making Walden "symbolic" of all women in the military; that is, it doesn't try to rest the entire issue of the suitability of women for combat on the shoulders of one individual. Instead, it treats her case as what it is--one case involving the valor of one officer--rather than as fodder for an argument for or against the inclusion of an entire class of people in the armed forces.
(Similarly, the film should be commended for its color-blind casting. Washington and Philips are both cast into non-race-specific roles that could have been played by whites without any rewriting, and while it seems ludicrous to compliment filmmakers on what, by 1996, should be a matter of course, it is still a fact that not all films are cast this way, and encouragement should be offered when they are.)
Naturally, if your politics are different than mine, you're probably thinking that it's unfair of me to criticize the film for (by and large) failing to espouse my particular beliefs. Actually, though, what I take issue with is the failure of Courage Under Fire to espouse any beliefs about war in general or the Gulf War in particular (apart, that is, from jingoistic complacency). Given that the filmmakers have set a human drama against a backdrop of a recent and extremely controversial war, which cost lives on both sides, it seems almost exploitative to make a movie with so little to offer, apart from an admittedly dramatic but ultimately meaningless story.
After dropping out of the Disney animated scene for a few years (I missed both The Lion King and Pocahontas), I was pleasantly surprised to return and discover a new maturity of theme in Disney's most recent release, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Added to their usual high standards regarding animation, talent, music, and script, the result is a highly entertaining film that can potentially provide an important lesson for children and adults alike.
Quasimodo (voiced by Tom Hulce), a deformed orphan, is the ward of the ruthless Parisian official Frollo (Tony Jay, in a performance reminiscent of George Sanders's Shere Khan in The Jungle Book). Frollo keeps Quasi confined to the bell tower of the Notre Dame cathedral, where Quasi rings the bells for mass, whittles beautiful models of the city and people below his perch, and confers with lively gargoyles Lavern, Victor, and Hugo (the latter two named in honor of the author of the classic novel that serves as the film's source material).
In an illicit visit to the outside world, Quasi falls in love with lovely Gypsy girl Esmerelda (Demi Moore), who is being persecuted by the Gypsy-hating Frollo and who immediately perceives the sensitive and kind person inside Quasi's unsightly exterior. Joining Quasi in defending Esmeralda against Frollo is the dashing Phoebus (Kevin Kline), Frollo's recalcitrant Captain of the Guards.
Like Disney's earlier Beauty and the Beast, Hunchback explores the idea that one's physical appearance does not necessarily speak to the beauty of one's inner spirit. However, in Beast, the Beast himself provides both sides of the coin; he starts off as physically attractive but spiritually ugly, and--after being transformed to become externally ugly as well--learns how to behave kindly and belie his frightening countenance. In contrast, Quasi is naturally imbued with his generous spirit and carries it throughout the story of Hunchback; his opposite number is instead the vicious and hypocritical Frollo, a man of ordinary appearance who lies and murders without compunction but nonetheless considers himself virtuous and God-fearing. As the lyrics of one of the film's songs ask, "Who is the monster and who is the man?" Clearly, the answer cannot be found in physical appearances alone.
Having not read Hugo's book, I am ill-equipped to judge the film's adherence to its spirit, but I would guess that Disney has been relatively faithful (with the ending, I suspect, being a major exception), based on themes in the movie that also appear in Hugo's Les Miserables. Like the famous Inspector Javert of that work, Frollo possesses a rigid, unbendable sense of right and wrong but lacks any conception of compassion or mercy.
However, unlike Javert, Frollo excepts himself from his own rules, holding himself blameless for each of his many transgressions, including his own illicit sexual desire for Esmerelda and his willingness to abuse his authority in an attempt to possess her. It is refreshing to see the most unsavory failings of adults, such as hypocrisy and covetousness, surfacing in Disney's notoriously cleansed universe. And it is undeniably moving to see them contrasted with the unyielding goodness of Quasimodo.
The animation is of high quality; Disney's animators, as usual, show a terrific eye for light and color, producing images of great richness (although a few computer-generated images clash noticeably with the hand-drawn variety). Composer Alan Menken does his usual superior work, although his songs this time lack the irresistible catchiness which he has produced in the past, and Stephen Schwartz's lyrics are funny and sophisticated (I defy you to name another children's film which features the words "calumny" and "consternation" in the same song, much less in the same line). And the script contains the same scintillating verbal and physical humor that I last saw in Aladdin.
Hunchback is a highly humanistic work with a great amount of the old Disney appeal and (again excepting Disney's previous two efforts which I did not see) is possibly the overall finest animated work the studio has produced in many years.
Independence Day is an extremely silly movie. Fortunately, it's also lots of fun, and it sports breathtakingly good special effects besides.
The premise, as you must know (if you don't, please e-mail me and let me know exactly how you access the Internet from your cave), is that an alien fleet shows up at Earth's doorstep, intent on wiping out the human race. Led by U.S. President Whitmore (Bill Pullman, likable as always), the remainder of the world's military might combines to try and save the Earth from the extraterrestrial menace. Primary to the effort are an intrepid Marine fighter pilot (Will Smith) and an engineering whiz (Jeff Goldblum).
There's no point to listing the film's many ridiculous breakdowns in plausibility. (I have seen such a list; I believe it can be found on the web somewhere if you're interested.) Obviously the filmmakers didn't care about such things, so clearly we shouldn't either. What's more relevant is the degree to which they blatantly ripped off Star Wars; filmgoers will recognize any number of shots and sequences lifted almost directly from that film. Clearly originality wasn't a high priority either.
So what was? Special effects, of course. And Independence Day is an FX marvel. With a seamless combination of miniature and digital effects, the film makes its creatively imagined alien craft, and the havoc they wreak, appear chillingly realistic.
Director Roland Emmerich and producer Dean Devlin, who co-wrote the film, assembled a mostly-star cast to flesh out their laughably feeble characterizations. Most of these players go over the top: Judd Hirsch, who, as the Goldblum character's father, makes fully as credible an accented Orthodox Jewish parent as Laurence Olivier did in The Jazz Singer; Harvey Fierstein, who gushes neuroses as one of Goldblum's co-workers; Harry Connick Jr. as a hyper Marine comrade of Smith's; and Brent Spiner as a wild-haired, goofy researcher. Randy Quaid and Mary McDonnell turn in slightly more dignified performances as a drunken pilot and the First Lady, respectively.
Expectations, as always, are key. If you go to see Independence Day expecting a thoughtful story, true-to-life characterizations, or original ideas, you will be disappointed; if you go expecting a well-crafted shoot-'em-up, you won't be let down.
Well, it was bound to happen. Eventually, some filmmaker would say, "I really like that Quentin Tarantino. I want to make movies just like his."
Writer-director John Herzfeld is first out of the gate in this dubious category with 2 Days in the Valley. Apart from actually featuring cast and crew members with Tarantino credits (actors Eric Stoltz and, in a cameo role, Lawrence Tierney; costume designer Betsy Heimann), Valley reprises many of the main elements of Pulp Fiction: the complex, distinct but interlocking stories; the pounding, guitar-driven soundtrack; the "hip" attitude toward criminals and their foibles; the self-conscious use of San Fernando Valley locations; a fair amount of bloodshed; and most particularly, the "quest for redemption" theme.
(In fact, the film's production company was apparently named "Redemption," yielding the opening credit "A Redemption Picture." Thanks to this title card, future film historians may judge Pulp Fiction and Valley to be the progenitors of a new subgenre of gangster film, the "redemption picture." Sort of like a "morality play," I guess.)
The one major Pulp element Herzfeld was unable to recreate was its scintillating script. While entertaining enough, Valley lacks the sharp characterizations, dialogue, and naturalism of Pulp Fiction. Valley's situations and characterizations come off as much more contrived, and the plot twists are much more predictable.
The stories do accomplish one thing: they give a talented cast lots to do. James Spader does a delicious psychopath (I always thought he and Rob Lowe should have switched roles for Bad Influence); Danny Aiello is amusing as an inept Italian hitman with a heart of gold and a fear of canines; director Paul Mazursky turns up as a down-on-his-luck, suicidal ex-television director; and Stoltz portrays possibly the naivest cop on the L.A. force, whose partner (Jeff Daniels) is the looniest. The film also features Teri Hatcher, Louise Fletcher, Glenne Headly, Keith Carradine, and Austin Pendleton.
Roy "Tin Cup" McAvoy is the loser's loser, a master of the self-defeating gesture. Roy's machismo and pig-headedness, along with a general lack of smarts, have conspired to transcend his astounding talent at golf and instead land him squarely in the middle of nowhere, in terms of geography, career, and personal life--he's the pro at a brown, dusty driving range on the outskirts of Salome, Texas, and the closest thing he has to a girlfriend (an ex, in fact) is the aging owner/lead dancer at the local strip joint.
After attractive therapist Molly Griswold (Rene Russo) shows up for golf lessons, the smitten Roy (Kevin Costner) decides to make something of himself to impress her. With the help of his trusty caddy and drinking partner, Romeo (Cheech Marin), Roy decides to shoot for the most "democratic" of golf tournaments--the U.S. Open.
Ron Shelton has tilled similar ground before, most notably in Bull Durham. Tin Cup is not a full-on repeat of Shelton's debut film, but it follows much the same arc: a talented but foibled athlete on the fringe of his sport's "establishment" makes a run at conventional success and recognition, his quest liberally sprinkled with episodes of looniness and abandon (and romance). The looniness is, of course, the really fun part, and Shelton and co-writer (and golfing partner) John Norville have not skimped on those scenes: Roy amply and hilariously illustrates a buddy's comment to the effect that "'Roy' and 'normal' don't usual collide in the same sentence."
But Tin Cup never quite captures the poignancy of Bull Durham, perhaps because Roy's quest lacks urgency. Unlike Durham's Crash Davis, Roy is not racing to succeed while his body can still play the game, and the film imposes no external time limit on his wooing of Molly. Shelton's best characters reek of desperation: their time clocks are running down and the finish line seems like light-years away. So while Roy is a thoroughly likable rascal, and the watching of his story an exceedingly pleasant way to spend a couple of hours, his plight never takes on the last-ditch bravura that might have lifted Tin Cup McAvoy into the pantheon of all-time great characters where Crash resides (at least in my humble opinion).
Marin is extremely funny and effective, and Don Johnson cuts a marvelously sleazy figure as David Simms, Roy's old college teammate and now--as the epitome of the smooth, polished, "soulless" pro golfer--his nemesis. Russo has a hard time balancing Molly's mix of highly sensible and semi-dingbat (although in fairness, some or much blame might be accorded to the script).
And Costner is just terrific. Something about Shelton's writing brings out the best in Costner's performances, and he is what makes the movie work as well as it does. For, when all is said and done, Tin Cup is still an outstanding character study, and Costner's rambunctious, dim-bulb Tin Cup McAvoy is one hell of a character to study.
Herb Gardner adapted and directed I'm Not Rappaport from his stage play of the same name, and the film still retains a somewhat stagy quality (and pace, clocking in at about two-and-a-quarter hours).
Happily, however, stars Walter Matthau and Ossie Davis are absolute hoots as two New York octogenarians who share a bench in Central Park. Gardner's script is hilarious, wise, and sad, and Matthau and Davis make the most of it.
In general terms, Rappaport is about the different choices people make about how to live, and how the range of choices gets narrower as one gets older. Matthau's character, once a committed Communist, still rails against social injustice wherever he finds it, despite his enfeebled condition and heedless of any danger to himself or others; Davis's character Midge, a near-blind building superintendent, knows how to best keep himself out of trouble but spares no time to dabble in the world around him. The friction between their competing philosophies forms the basis for the film's story.
The story's stage origins are betrayed in Gardner's often static mise-en-scene and in the slow, deliberate pacing, but on the other hand, the story's unhurried flow is appropriate to the subject matter. The story occasionally gives in to excess--particularly toward the end, in a scene in which Matthau attempts to aid another of the park's denizens--but always finds its way back to its main point.
The film features fine supporting performances from Craig T. Nelson, Martha Plimpton, Boyd Gaines, and Amy Irving. Adam Holander's cinematography captures the beautiful but occasionally hard-edged urban park setting, and kudos are also due to the sound team, which mixes the sounds of the city--such as street musicians and a nearby carousel--effectively with the action onscreen.
If you're anything like me, you'd rather walk over swords than go back to junior high school. So far, the seventh and eighth grades still rate as the nadir of my life, and I don't even want to imagine what circumstances could dislodge them.
Todd Solondz's Welcome to the Dollhouse (co-produced by my old college classmate Dan Partland!) is the first and only film I've seen that authentically taps into the spirit-crushing experience that is junior high for the unpopular student. Fortunately, the film's mode is black comedy, which may, after all, be the only sensible way to tackle the subject.
Solondz's main character, Dawn Wiener, can't get a break. At school she is lonely, outcast, and a constant subject of teasing and harrassment; at home she is neglected in favor of her nerdy older brother and her "perfect" ballerina sister. Even her sole comforts, the backyard clubhouse she shares with a fellow outcast and her dreams of finding love, prove inadequate refuge from the pain of adolescence.
Far from being a sentimental and admiring portrait of the long-suffering Dawn, however, the film dares to demonstrate how the victim can become the victimizer. Dawn is fully capable of taking her parents' neglect of her and re-directing it toward her own younger sister, of taking the scorn and abuse of her school tormentors and firing it back at those even farther down the scale than herself. And far from presenting adolescents as the sole practicioners of middle-school-level horrors, the film suggests that "adult" behaviors teach children their brutality.
Solondz's greatest tool as a director is his mise-en-scene. The film's best shots are ironic studies in contrast: Dawn's little sister pirouetting next to the sprinkler on the all-too-suburban front lawn; Dawn getting dressed down by the school principal while classmates flip her off outside the window behind him. And Solondz's greatest tool as a writer is his empathy for and understanding of his characters, his refusal to make them into cardboard representatives of good and bad.
I wouldn't go back to junior high if you paid me, but Welcome to the Dollhouse is a safe and worthwhile way to visit for a little while.
The story goes that Matt Ross was originally hired as a production assistant--the lowliest position on a film set--for Ed's Next Move. But apparently, writer/director John Walsh took a good hard look at Ross and saw the very qualities he wanted in his hapless protagonist, Ed Brodsky. Ross was promoted--to star of the movie. It was a great call.
The film, a product of the New York independent film scene, is a charmer. After Ed, a young Wisconsite and certified "nice guy," is dropped by his girlfriend, he decides there's no reason not to accept a job offer in New York City. So off he goes, moving into a Manhattan apartment with Ray (Kevin Carroll) and losing little time in falling in love with Natalie (Callie Thorne), a musician with a local bar band (portrayed hilariously by Ed's Redeeming Qualities). The tough part, naturally, is getting Natalie to fall in love with him.
The greatest flaws of Ed's Next Move are its occasional tendency toward sophomoric humor and a few tonally-jarring (if amusing) fantasy sequences. But its generally funny script and totally winning performances more than compensate.
Yes, it's true that--as at least one other reviewer has charged--Michael Apted's Extreme Measures is nothing but rehashed Coma. But it's well-executed and, most importantly, it features an irresistible leading man in Hugh Grant.
Grant has built up a solid--if fairly unvarying--persona as a comedic actor, and in this dramatic outing, he employs it to good effect during the first section of the film, arousing our sympathy and liking as Guy, a (surprise!) British doctor at New York's don't-get-no-respect Gramercy Hospital. By the time he gets in up to his sixth vertebra in a mysterious medical plot, we are re-acquainted enough with his mischievous smile and self-effacing wit to want to see him live through the rest of the film.
Gene Hackman makes an effective villain, and Sarah Jessica Parker is competent as a Gramercy colleague of Guy's. The script is surprisingly honest in keeping its characters from doing dumb, unnatural things in order to advance the plot, although the story does contain the usual share of ridiculous implausibilities, along with an unnecessarily pious moral messsage (I'm sure all Nazi geneticists will hang their heads in shame on their way out of the theater) and a silly, superfluous epilogue.
Apted's direction is assured and sometimes stylish: toward the end, there's even a nice, Citizen Kane-esque shot in which both an extreme foreground character and a background character are in sharp focus at the same time (an effect probably achieved with a split-focus lens). Apted's direction and Grant's personable performance add up to an entertaining, if insubstantial, thriller.
It's a good thing that Mike Leigh has little use for the conventions of Hollywood filmmaking. A film as extraordinary as Secrets & Lies does not come about in a conventional fashion, and it would be a pity if such films didn't come along at all.
Leigh's vaunted technique starts with a free-form writing process. Although he takes the writing credit, the film's screenplay is in fact largely improvised by the cast during pre-production. Leigh's performers, given the chance to decide for themselves what their characters would be likely to say or do in a given situation, produce a result which is much more like watching real life than like watching a movie. This illusion is further enhanced by Leigh's tendency to cast actors who, while exceedingly talented, do not have the striking looks and telegenic flash of movie stars. They come across, instead, remarkably like flesh-and-blood people.
I won't describe the plot at all, except to say that it centers on the families of a sister and brother in London. (Since Leigh eschews conventional exposition, much of the fun, at least early on, lies in trying to figure out even the very basic aspects of what is going on. Americans may have to listen especially carefully to do so; much of the dialogue is in a frequently thick local accent and is often fast-paced as well.) I will say that the story is deeply involving and affecting, a compelling portrait of family dynamics and how they are affected (as you can well guess) by secrets and lies.
The technical values are as stunning as the uniformly superb performances. The cinematography and production design are rich and detailed, while remaining uncompromisingly naturalistic. The musical score, primarily string arrangements, enhances the story beautifully without ever being overbearing. Similarly, the editing carries the potent flow of emotions along without ever actively distracting the viewer; in fact, a number of shots are quite long and static, allowing each viewer to follow the scene in his or her own way, without having his or her attention forced by intercutting.
It is a rare film that never once forces me to consider the artifice of what I'm watching, when not one moment seems contrived or false, when no overt technical wizardry leaps off of the screen, when I forget that I'm watching a movie and not intruding on real people's lives. Secrets & Lies is such a film, and if such an experience sounds appealing to you, then this is not a film you should miss.
In a way, Michael Collins is the mirror image of writer/director Neil Jordan's earlier film The Crying Game. Both films feature an Irish Republican Army terrorist as their protagonist, but where Crying Game explored the personal issues that lie beneath the political, Michael Collins explores the political territory that lies beneath the personal.
The historical Michael Collins was responsible, according to the film's captions, for introducing terrorist warfare to the Irish struggle, for then negotiating peace with the British, and finally for trying to quell the resulting factional unrest in Ireland. Overtly, the film is interested in depicting the man behind the politics, the tremendous personality that dominated the landscape of his time: Collins's conflicts with Irish Republic president Eamon "Dev" De Valera (Alan Rickman); his powerful friendship with comrade Harry Boland (Aidan Quinn); his love for Harry's girlfriend Kitty (Julia Roberts).
But underneath and almost obscured by the personal saga, the film subtly chronicles Collins's profound shift in politics: from believing that no price is too high to achieve an ideal to--having seen the consequences of this policy--insisting on compromise in order to bring about peace. However, until Collins's transformation takes place--almost three-quarters of the way into the story--the film's portrayal of terrorism as heroism seems perilously close to propaganda.
I was chilled by the film's glorification of cold-blooded murder, despite Jordan's attempts to retain audience sympathy by constantly depicting the British as monstrous and the Irish as virtuous. In deference to the sensibilities of fair-minded audiences, Jordan even allows Collins nobly to curse the British for forcing him to order a round of executions. I think we're intended to buy Collins's sentiment at face value, and it's fortunate for the film that you don't have to--Collins's subsequent about-face takes away the necessity of accepting his earlier views on political violence. (It should be noted that neither the film's Collins nor, more importantly, Jordan ever actually renounce Collins's earlier methods. Instead, both simply note the tragedy that the creation of the Irish free state failed to make further violence unnecessary.)
Liam Neeson is a magnificent actor, and he illuminates Collins's inner life with skill and passion. It is a pity, in a way, that a younger man was not cast to more closely match historical fact (Neeson is said to have resisted the role for exactly this reason), since Collins's political aging might have played more ironically in contrast with a youthful physical appearance. However, Neeson's performance makes it hard to quibble. Alan Rickman and Aidan Quinn give strong performances in the relatively two-dimensional roles of De Valera and Boland (as foils to Collins, neither is ever given the opportunity to show us what makes them tick). Stephen Rea is easy to overlook as Broy, an Irishman collaborating with British forces in Dublin; as in Crying Game, he is capable of communicating immense ambivalence with a single, dour expression, and it's regrettable that the film does not give him enough to do. Julia Roberts is just awful as Kitty: her idea of exhibiting love is to favor the object of her fancy with a look of fawning adoration (when the script calls for her fancy to change, she simply aims her look at someone else), and her Irish accent ranges from overly studied and forced (rarely) to completely nonexistent (mostly). The film's narrative moves briskly along, although it suffers from a few odd lapses, such as an abrupt and confusing transition from De Valera making a (poor) tactical decision to the aftermath some time later. The film's technical credits are superb, from Chris Menges's desaturated cinematography to the convincing production design and the dark orchestral score.
Larry Bishop's intriguing gangster send-up, Mad Dog Time, has much to recommend it--fine performances from a stellar cast, lush production design and cinematography, and a hilariously mordant script. Sadly, however, the film is undone by its terminal case of detachment--it's seemingly too cool, too slick to spend much time on being about anything, apart from the blood-soaked antics of some pretty twisted folks.
Ace triggerman Mickey Holliday (Jeff Goldblum) and his rival Ben London (Gabriel Byrne) jockey for position as their boss, a gangster known only as "Vic," heads back to town after an extended absence. Vic is rumored to be out for vengeance on those who crossed him while he was gone--"It's mad dog time," Ben chortles--and indeed, there's a bloodbath in the offing.
Goldblum acquits himself nicely in the role of steel-nerved killer. It's always a pleasant change to see him in a role other than Eccentric Genius, a part which he created for The Fly and has recently regurgitated for Jurassic Park, Powder and Independence Day. Ellen Barkin also does well as Rita Everly, Holliday's femme fatale. But the star of the show is Byrne, whose "Brass Balls" Ben is like Dr. Seuss on amphetamines, a whirling dervish of quick rhymes, wit, and lunacy. You'll have fun spotting a panoply of other stars as well--I won't ruin things by naming them here.
The movie's bloodshed wouldn't be so disturbing if there seemed to be a reason for it, apart from providing an excuse for dark humor. But the film has nothing else to offer, at least nothing I could figure out (although there seemed to be vague intimations of an existential theme--a sort of a Beckett-meets-Tarantino thing, perhaps). In fact, there are even hints that the entire thing is a shaggy dog story.
The film is purposely set in an indefinable world--a nameless, unidentifiable city, in a time period that could be anywhere between the '50s and the present. The film itself remains similarly indefinable--caught somewhere between comedy and horror, between deadly serious and big joke. Had the filmmakers made choices about which of these things Mad Dog Time was and wasn't to be--or made their choices clearer to the viewer if they did choose--the experience of seeing it might be more rewarding. As it is, Mad Dog Time exists somewhere between extremely entertaining (if puzzling) romp and total waste of time. You make the call.
Big Night, the story of two Italian brothers in the 1950s who open a seashore restaurant, is charming but unfocused, a winning but scattershot portrayal of life on the edge of the American dream. Older brother Primo (Tony Shalhoub), although painfully shy, is a brilliant chef who has nothing but contempt for those who do not appreciate fine cooking--particularly his. Primo's younger brother, the dashing Secondo (Stanley Tucci, who also co-wrote with Joseph Tropiano), is not only co-chef, waiter, and maitre d', he is also the one with the commercial vision for the restaurant--and the sole keeper of the knowledge that the enterprise is failing badly.
In a way, Big Night shares certain thematic concerns with Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway: both examine the degree, if any, to which art and commerce can successfully be separated. But whereas in Bullets this conflict was embodied in the one character portrayed by John Cusack, it is here split between Primo, the uncompromising artist, and Secondo, the pragmatist.
More importantly, where Bullets makes this theme its central point, Big Night treats it as a side issue. Big Night is just as interested in being a character study of its protagonists and of the small ensemble they relate to: Cristiano the busboy; Secondo's girlfriend Phyllis (Minnie Driver); father figure Pascal (Ian Holm), the owner of a popular rival restaurant; and Pascal's girlfriend Gabriella (Isabella Rosellini); as well as a host of side characters, such as Bob the car salesman (played by Campbell Scott, who co-directed with Tucci).
But it never quite succeeds as a character study either: Primo is too simple a soul to be of much interest, and the motivations of Secondo, whom the film follows most faithfully, are too often left enigmatic. His surface goal--trying to save the restaurant--is clear, but Secondo makes a number of choices which the film leaves unexplained.
Even so, the film possesses a richness of emotion which does it credit. When added to impressive performances, modest but winning production values, and some of the best on-screen cuisine this side of Babette's Feast and Eat Drink Man Woman, the result is, if ultimately unsatisfying, at least highly likable.
Mildred (Gena Rowlands), an older woman whose husband is dead and whose two grown children can take her only in small doses, leads a quiet suburban existence of tending to house and garden. Just when it appears that life has no surprises to offer Mildred, a trashy neighbor (Marisa Tomei) prevails on her to babysit her young, shy son, and Mildred's life begins to change in subtle but fundamental ways.
Unhook the Stars, co-written and directed by Nick Cassavetes, is a quiet, unassuming affair, which makes its story all the more charming. The film makes no grand pronouncements on the meaning of family, on the heartbreaks and rewards of parenthood, on friendship, independence, or love; and yet it covers all these subjects in an emotionally engaging way.
Rowlands and Tomei are superb, as is much of the rest of the cast. Gerard Depardieu, a co-producer of the film, has a small but winning role as a Quebecois truck driver (cleverly masking his still-shaky, and sometimes nearly incomprehensible, English enunciation).
Music is capable of unleashing strong emotions, even more so perhaps for the performer than for the listener. Scott Hicks's remarkable Shine examines the terrible cost that a devotion to music can exact from those who attempt to play it, particularly from one with fragile emotions.
Shine is based on the true story of David Helfgott, a piano prodigy who, growing up, suffers emotional abuse at the hands of his domineering father (Armin Mueller-Stahl), who in turn has been hopelessly damaged by his experiences as a survivor of the Holocaust. David's dedication to his music is his only escape from his stultifying home life, but the sheer unadulterated passion of the piece he is drawn to--the terrifying Rachmaninoff "3"--poses dangers of its own.
David is portrayed compellingly as a teenager by Noah Taylor and as an adult by Geoffrey Rush. Their performances, as well as Mueller-Stahl's agonizing turn as Peter Helfgott and John Gielgud's as a kindly conservatory instructor, are a highlight, as is Geoffrey Simpson's stark, beautiful photography.
There are touches of the mad and the brilliant in Hicks's direction, as if in echo of David Helfgott's own virtuosity (Helfgott's own piano recordings appear on the soundtrack)--a montage of David studying the Rach 3 at conservatory is an incredible set piece. And, also like Helfgott, Hicks tells and resolves his story in an utterly original--and very poignant--manner.
The credit that drew me to see The People vs. Larry Flynt was not that of actor Woody Harrelson, or of rock star/debuting actress Courtney Love, or of director Milos Forman. It was that of screenwriters Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski. Based on Ed Wood alone, one of my favorite films of 1994, I was prepared to crown the duo the reigning Kings of the Biopic. With Flynt, they have in my book cemented their claim to the title.
This is not to take away from the tremendous achievements of the other above-mentioneds, nor from other outstanding cast members and technical contributors. But what makes Flynt, and Wood, what they are is Alexander and Karaszewski's ethic of choosing an unlikely protagonist, one whose life's work is to many people nothing more than an object of contempt or derision, and being able to show us ourselves in these people--drives and emotions that we can understand and relate to completely.
The Larry Flynt given to us by the writers and Harrelson is not a very civilized guy: the crude, explicit magazine he publishes actually seems to represent his idea of class; he pursues women even more arduously than money; and he has no concept of correct public comportment. But his sins are more those of manners and taste than anything else: he has ideas about fair play and loyalty, and honors them steadfastly. As such, he is someone we can respect and even admire. Through his willingness to risk his fortune and his freedom for an "abstract" principle of liberty--freedom of the press--he even becomes something like a hero.
A more detached approach to filmmaking might have resulted in a more cerebral exercise, a classroom lesson in civil liberties: here is a person whose ideas are offensive to many, who nonetheless has the right to publish what he wishes. Instead, Alexander, Karaszewski, and the cast and crew of Flynt have gone one step beyond, and made Larry Flynt sympathetic.
Courtney Love and Edward Norton turn in outstanding performances. The production design, which captures a variety of times and locations with realism and vibrancy, is also worthy of note.
Special thanks to: